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Grey
Grey is an original fictional character who first appeared in New Mutants: Last Class. Character History Background As the youngest of 6 children, Galo Ruiz has always had to compete for attention. Too small best his elders in physical games, and too young to be in school that could issue him good grades, Galo had to rely on his wit and innate sense of humour to distinguish himself from his siblings. Fun and laughter became his specialty, and through humour Galo learned how to befriend good hearted people and how to forgive the rest, and how to deal with adversity by seeing the lighter side to everything in life. All of these abilities were tested the day Galo woke up a mutant. One of his sisters was the first to notice; she screamed and ran from him, not even recognizing her own little brother. Even Galo reacted with fear when he first caught sight of himself in the mirror: he had transformed overnight into some sort of hideous monster with bald, wrinkly grey skin, solid black eyes, four-fingered hands, a toothless mouth, and an oddly deformed head. It was a hell of a shock - and without a doubt the coolest thing that had ever happened to him. Getting people's attention was guaranteed, and the reactions he elicited went beyond his wildest dreams: usually fear at first, but that was soon overcome with human curiosity and bewilderment. Breaking that sort of tension with a good joke or physical gag produced the most amazing results. He was an instant hit in his hometown of Poza Rica, Mexico, and briefly considered a career in entertainment before he discovered the rest of his mutation. As it turned out, his bizarre appearance was only the beginning. Galo developed the ability to open small rifts in space, connecting one location to another. It wasn't easy - it felt like he had to literally tear a hole in the fabric of reality, which would snap shut the moment he let go - but it allowed him to effectively teleport small items by passing them through his portals. Intrigued, he begged his parents to let him transfer to the Xavier Academy, a school for young mutants that had just reopened in New York. New Mutants: Last Class Galo eventually wore his parents down, and bid farewell to his large family before hopping on a plane to New York. He arrived along with roughly a dozen other new students, each and every one a mutant of some shape or variety. It was at the same time the most amazing thing he'd ever seen, and a complete let down. Sure, the school was loaded with awesome - his classes were taught by the actual X-Men for crying out loud - but to his disappointment he realized that he had just gone from being the most special and interesting person for miles around to being just one of dozens of other mutants. Thankfully he still had his well-honed sense of humour to disginguish himself. Galo made friends quickly, particularly among the likes of Alex Derasmo, Santo Vaccarro, Karl Schuler, and Joe Beaudry. He loved the sound of the school's weekly team-based competitions, and so joined Match's Paragon's squad. His assigned codename, "Grey", was a fitting choice. Timeskip and the Last Stand Galo kept his grades at at least a passing level, choosing to focus most of his time and effort on his electives and various clubs, and of course the Xavier Cup competition. He often joked that the Paragons should have been named "the Paradox", as squad advisor Match's hot-headed (literally) competitive streak routinely clashed with squad leader's Indra's pacifism and overly-generous personality. Watching the two of them struggle over strategy and tactics was amusing, and Galo was always there to step in with a tension-diffusing joke whenever things got too heated. In actual squad competitions, Galo made a particularly good team with squadmate Chuntao Hu, whose shrinking ability allowed her to pass through Galo's narrow portals. With the help of fellow teleporters like Alex, Galo eventually learned how to expand his portals to a size that would actually admit a full grown human, which further expanded the tactical advantage he could offer his squad. Galo was among the students sent into a portal to Wakanda prior to the climactic battle between the X-Men and the Purifiers that would be known as The Last Stand of the X-Men. Forge had built the portal himself, and the students where told that they were merely being sent to Wakanda for their own safety; Anole, a fully-fledged X-Man, had been selected to lead the mission and was promised that he would be able to return immediately in order to join his team in the fight. But Galo could instinctively sense the nature of portals and knew that this one was not just a simple hop from point to point - it was a portal in time as well. Moreover, it was only going to be a one-way trip. He would later confide to his closest friends that he knew about the ruse in advance and yet said nothing, but has never had the courage to tell Anole. Given his appearance, Galo had little choice but to remain in Wakanda following the passage of the Superhuman Registration Act that effectively turned mutants into outlaws, and the subsequent adoption of similar laws in his home country. He became a founding member of Unity, and did his best to keep spirits light over the difficult years that followed. Unity headquarters are a pretty boring place to live compared to the good old days at Xavier's, and Galo makes as many trips into Wakanda as he can get away with. He badly misses his family and those remaining mutant friends who have chosen to live in hiding around the world, and is eager to see the day that the SRA is repealed. Powers and Abilities Galo is a Beta-level mutant. His mutantion dramatically changed his physical appearance, leaving him looking remarkably like a stereotypical "grey"-style alien. His primary mutant ability allows him to open portals linking two points in space. The distance between the portals is irrelevant, but he must physically open one side of the portal, and must place the second side within line of sight, or in an equally obvious location. These portals can vary in size, ranging anywhere from the size of a coin to a maximum diameter of roughly 20 feet. As an extension of this power, Galo also possesses something akin to a sixth sense related to distortions in space and time. This allows him to sense and even track the movements of other telporters within an effective radius of up to 100 yards, and can even detect the traces of a teleportation event hours or even days after the fact. Galo has had basic training in self-defense but has allowed his skills to degrade over time and is not a competent fighter in hand-to-hand combat. He is a talented comedian and is self-taught in street and table magic. Theme thumb|500px|left Category:Original Characters Category:Male Characters Category:Teleporters Category:Mexicans Category:Xavier Institute Category:Unity Category:Beta-level Mutants